VII
Ballista watched the long line of ox-wagons. There were ten of them, each drawn by eight bullocks. Slowly and very noisily, half hidden by the dust raised, they pulled into a wide circle. The drivers unspanned the beasts and began to herd them down to water in the river. There seemed no end to the animals.
‘Ho, Sarmatians, where are your women?’ one of the Urugundi called.
From under their caps, the drivers cast dark looks at the Goth.
‘Driving wagons is women’s work,’ the Urugundi said to Ballista in the language of the north. ‘Once, the Sarmatians were lords here. Now they are our skalks. These Sarmatian slaves try to keep their women away from us.’ He laughed. ‘They are right to. Their women are a good ride — big tits, good fat arses. They have no interest in their husbands when they have had a Goth between their thighs.’
The gudja silenced the warrior with a curt gesture then spoke to the drivers in a language Ballista did not know, presumably Sarmatian. It could be the tiresome interpreter Biomasos might have a use after all. The Sarmatians grudgingly acknowledged whatever the gudja had told them and carried on seeing to the oxen and hobbling the dozen or so horses which had travelled tied to the rear of the carts.
‘Now the wagons are here, my Goths will take the boats downstream to Tanais.’ The gudja spoke to Ballista in the language of Germania. ‘I will remain to guide you to the Heruli. Their winter pastures are not far from here, but they left for their summer ones some time ago. It will be a long journey east and north before we overhaul them.’
‘Thank you,’ Ballista said.
‘I doubt you will when we reach them. As everyone will have told you, they are not as other men, and their ruler Naulobates is the worst of all. The superstitious say he is not a man at all but a malignant daemon.’ The gudja smiled, as if in anticipation of the encounter.
‘I have no choice in the matter.’
‘No, I suppose you do not. The Sarmatians can help your slaves load your baggage. I will keep one wagon for myself and my servant.’ At the mention of her, the priest’s ill-favoured acolyte gave a one-toothed, senile grin.
Maximus leant close to Ballista. ‘Thank the gods we will not be without female company. Do you think the old Goth will share her?’
The next morning, the Goths were gone not long after first light. By midday, the remainder had gone nowhere. Ballista had allocated the wagons, apart from that already claimed by the gudja. The meagre money for ransoms had been divided into two. The soldiers loaded the gold into the carts in which Castricius and Ballista himself would travel. Hordeonius then officiously ordered his auxiliary archers to stand guard over them. It was a rare command of the centurion’s with which his men were perfectly happy. As it transpired, no one seemed to want to trust the Sarmatians with handling their property; conquest and cuckoldry were thought to do something to a man. So the tribesmen sat and scratched themselves as seven slaves tried to break camp and manhandle everything into the wagons. Biomasos the interpreter, Porsenna the haruspex and the other imperial functionaries, let alone the eunuchs, knew such manual labour to be far beneath their dignitas.
To get somewhat out of the chill north wind, Ballista and the freemen of his familia sat in the shelter of some willows. Castricius, Biomasus and the two eunuchs joined them. They talked in a random, inconsequential fashion as they watched the uninspiring scene.
‘If I was the sort of man to fuck another man’s wife,’ Maximus said, ‘ideally, I would like to see him disarmed.’
They all looked at the nearest Sarmatian. He was leaning in the lee of his wagon; a big man, blond, handsome. From his boots to his cap, his clothes were embroidered nomad-style. Everything about him was surprisingly clean. On his hip was a long, straight sword, suitable for a mounted warrior. A long dagger was strapped to his thigh. He had a coiled bullwhip thrust through his belt.
‘The Urugundi might have told more than the truth,’ Ballista said.
‘It could be a Sarmatian cares more if you take his sword than his wife,’ Hippothous said. ‘His chief god is worshipped as a sword, and he swears his most solemn oaths on his sword. On the other hand, if he comes home to his tent and finds another man’s quiver hanging outside, he wanders off until the stranger has finished with his wife.’
‘Marvellous,’ Maximus said. ‘A whole tribe of complaisant husbands.’
‘Oh no,’ Hippothous said, ‘no good even for you. You see, nomad women are quite hideous. Because they breathe the damp, thick air of the Steppe, drink water from snow and ice and do no hard work but sit in wagons all the time, their bodies are not hardened. They are heavy and fleshy, their joints covered, watery and relaxed, their cavities very moist. Not being swaddled as children, they are disgustingly flabby. Their very obesity prevents them receiving male seed easily.’
‘I do not know, it does not sound too bad,’ Maximus said. ‘I sometimes like my women carrying a bit of weight — warmth in the winter, shade in the summer — moist cavities and little danger of getting them pregnant. Did I ever tell you about the time — ’
‘Nonsense.’ The interpreter cut him off. ‘The promiscuity of nomads derives from an outdated story in Herodotus about one tribe, the Agathyrsi. The Sarmatians, like their cousins the Alani, are polygamous. Having several wives does not mean they are happy if another man tries to lie with them. Doubtless the Heruli are the same.’
‘It is Strabo the geographer who claims that nomad women in general are available,’ Hippothous said. ‘Anyway, they smell, never wash.’ He addressed the latter to Maximus.
‘I heard they kept their virginity until they had killed three men in battle,’ Castricius said.
‘And cut their right breast off,’ added Ballista.
‘Their mothers are said to burn them off,’ the interpreter pedantically corrected.
The wind had got up, whipping the branches above their heads. The sky was dark, threatening rain. Down by the river, bitterns boomed, deep and resonant.
‘Gods below, it is getting cold,’ said Maximus.
‘Not as cold as it will be out on the Steppe,’ remarked Castricius. ‘Winter is near continuous all year round. The north winds are charged with bitter rain, chilled with ice and snow.’
‘Mules and asses die in the cold, and cattle lose their horns,’ Mastabates joined in. ‘Only animals small enough to live underground can survive.’
‘And summer lasts but a few days. Even then there is mist. On the few occasions the sun does appear, it has little warmth,’ Castricius said.
‘That is not what Strabo says,’ Hippothous put in. He seemed to be attempting to outdo the interpreter in pedantry. ‘According to the geographer, the summer heat is too severe for those unaccustomed to it. Anyway, as a man of culture, I look forward to seeing strange and wonderful creatures — the tarandos, which changes its colour, and the colos, which runs swifter than a deer. It drinks through its nostrils and stores water in its head.’
‘Fat and smelly? Well, I do not really care, as long as they are willing,’ Maximus mused. ‘Actually, even if they are not all that at first…’
A violent gust of wind ripped across the river, bringing the first of the rain. It was not yet heavy, but squalls flurried across the ground where the camp had stood, around the wagons. The beasts stood in what shelter they could find, heads down.
‘Enough of this. Everyone on their feet,’ Ballista announced. ‘Help get your things into your wagons.’ The company scattered, heads cocked into their shoulders against the rain.
Ballista walked over to where the auxiliaries were sheltering in and around the wagons with the gold. ‘Where is your centurion?’ Hordeonius stuck his head out from under the felt canopy, half sketched a salute. ‘Leave half your men on guard, and send the others to load the wagons,’ Ballista ordered.
‘But…’
‘Yes, Centurion?’ Ballista’s voice was icily polite.